95-97 % of the world's precious opal comes from Australia. Precious opal is different from common opal because of its "play of color" . You can see flashes of color as it is turned. This gemstone is drop dead gorgeous when it also displays adularescence, a form of iridescence.
Now watch the Australian owner of Broken River opal miner crack open veined rocks! Sue Cooper is the female opal miner who shares the excitement in seeing the exposed opal for the first time!
Broken River Mining explains :"Boulder opal is term used to describe precious opal that occurs in 'veins' or 'pockets' in ironstone boulders. It is only found in one part of the world - Queensland, Australia."
This is a small company which uses environmentally responsible mining practices. I have no association with them but I love seeing their reveals of this lovely gemstone! Nature's art.
Reveal #1
Reveal # 2
And here is a demo on how they cut the opal for jewelry making :
Before You Go:
- When You Cannot Identify a Gemstone.....
- Quick Tests You Can Do to Test for Fake Gemstones
- Mohs Scale of Mineral Hardness
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Original Post by THE BEADING GEM
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Thank you, Pearl. Fascinating and, of course, beautiful.
ReplyDeleteWOW! WOW! WOW!!
ReplyDeleteI think I could stand there forever and watch them do that! When he first opened that rock I gasped - same with the second opening. I even winced a little when he was cleaning off the face of it - simply because every little bit seems so precious!
What a gorgeous gemstone!
Thanks so much for this Pearl. What a wonderful way to start my day!
Opals truly are one of nature's wonders. As you know, synthetic ones can be created in a lab and while they can be almost as beautiful, there is nothing like the real thing. I had to laugh at the image of you scraping pearls against you teeth since I have done that myself. I can just imagine the look on people's faces when you do it.
ReplyDeleteLOL! Thanks for reading that older post. Actually I didn't scrape pearls against my teeth - that would have grossed my students at my workshops out! I use my fingernail to test for that distinctive grittiness of pearls.
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